


Hope for the Future

by StimmyMage



Category: Xena: Warrior Princess
Genre: F/F, Fix-It, I just want them to be a happy family, an odd family but a happy one
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-11
Updated: 2020-05-10
Packaged: 2021-03-03 05:47:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,268
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24119737
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StimmyMage/pseuds/StimmyMage
Summary: Hope was "cured" of her fast aging and evil tendencies by Amazon mystics. Solan is ready to join his mother on the road. And little Eve will never know a life without her mothers and big siblings. This is everyone Xena wants. But she isn't sure about how their lives will have to change now, and how she can continue being a warrior and force for good while protecting her family.
Relationships: Gabrielle/Xena
Comments: 2
Kudos: 17





	Hope for the Future

The campsite was deathly quiet. Even the evening crickets chirping sounded far away.  Xena watched the smoke  rise up and disappear into the velvet-dark sky, idly rocking 3-month-old Eve. Gabrielle was brushing Argo. Gabrielle had been brushing Argo for the last hour, and her bowl of stew had gone cold on a nearby rock.

“Gabrielle, if she gets any shinier, I won’t be able to look at my own horse.”

With a sudden, sharp motion, she threw down the brush and perched on a rock.  Xena noticed, with something like amusement, that Gabrielle had gotten almost as good at the sharp glare as her. “Are you going to tell me what’s going on, or do I have to guess?”

“Do you even know what day it is?” Gabrielle’s voice was rarely sharp. Usually it held the bright possibilities of her stories, or occasionally the dark clouds of her gloomy and regretful moods. But sharp was rare.

“Um, no. I don’t. Did I forget something?”

“It’s her third birthday.”

Xena felt any hint of humor or good mood at the warm evening vanish. “Gabrielle...”

“ Melosa said it might be safe in three years.”

“Yeah, I was there. But—”

“I have to try, Xena. She’s my baby.”

It was silent for a long time. Gabrielle watched  Xena , wondering if she could ever get over Hope’s beginnings, but  Xena wasn’t thinking about Hope. Her mind was filled with images of creeping through a forest at night, a tiny being wiggling under her cloak, handing him off in the hope his life might be a little safer...

Finally, she just said, “I know.”

It had been a while since they had picked up any missions; they both thought it best to take a break while caring for a baby. Thus, it was perfectly convenient to head for Amazon territory the next day. It was an unusually tense three-day journey. Gabrielle spent the first day in near-silence while  Xena busied herself with carrying Eve—which wasn’t strictly necessary, given the cradle she’d added to her saddle, but it gave her something to do. She wasn’t very good at leaving Gabrielle alone—when had that  happened?— but she understood that she needed her time.

The second day, Gabrielle took over carrying Eve, which left  Xena without much of anything to do but throw her chakram up in the air like a discus and catch it again. She missed Gabrielle’s constant chatter and story ideas, more than she would have ever admitted. Around lunch time, she began to slow Argo, looking for a clearing. Gabrielle had been walking a distance behind but hadn’t noticed the change of pace, and soon  Xena could hear her.

She was carrying Eve in a sling around her chest, stroking her tiny forehead and talking to her. “I know it’s dangerous, and I know it’s not fair, but sometimes I really think she can’t get it. She should, but she doesn’t. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen her smile the way she does at you, Little One. I love you and your little toes too, I do. But I need that, too. I have a baby, you know. And I love her, the way we both love you. You’ll like her. She had some problems, before, but the Amazons have helped her so she can come home.”

Xena bit the inside of her cheek. It took all her willpower not to say that she’d never let Hope near her child. It was true, but it would only make Gabrielle more upset. Better to be  quiet, but hold Eve close. Besides, she really couldn’t take much more of this silence from her talkative love.

Taking a deep breath, and impressed by her own control, she said, “Thank you for not insisting we go faster.”

Gabrielle started, looking up guiltily. “How much did you...?”

Xena was relieved when her smile came easily. “It’s alright. I want you to know that I do  understand, and I do care. I’m not going to say I’m not still wary, but...I’m sorry, for the way I’ve reacted the past few years.”

“Oh,” she clearly hadn’t expected that. “um. That’s alright, I suppose. But...please promise that you’ll try. Try to see that she can be good. Please, Xena.”

“Alright. I will try.”  _ For you, I would try anything _ .

The rest of the journey was a little more normal, though Gabrielle’s chatter was more anxious than usual. “Will she remember me, will she like me, should we stop and buy her a doll?”  Xena did not mention that the child who at two weeks old threw a fit and burned down a clearing could have by now killed an entire Amazon camp. And Gabrielle did not mention that her heart felt one step from despairing of life if they found anything other than a normal child.

The camp was not burned down. It was still standing, with perhaps even a few more huts than the last time they had visited three years ago. Women sparred across the plaza or sat holding hands in the shade.  Melosa leaned against a wooden railing, with no sign of her rank except for the confident way she was directing people. They had, as usual, been intercepted near the edge of Amazon territory and were being escorted by two women they hadn’t met before, but who clearly knew who Gabrielle was. One, with her black hair in a million braids, seemed fascinated by the right-of-caste princess who traveled and gathered tales. The other, shorter with silky black hair, seemed mildly offended that one who had never lived there with them could be considered an Amazon. They had bickered about it most of the way. Xena raised an amused eyebrow at Gabrielle, but the younger woman looked lost in thought and hadn’t noticed the conversation at all.

Xena had barely registered where their friend was standing when Gabrielle ran towards her, startling the guards standing nearby, who might have run her through if  Melosa hadn’t noticed in time to wave them off.

“ Melosa !” she gasped. “Is Hope...is she here?”

“It’s nice to see you, too. And yes, she is. She’s safe, as I promised.”

“May I see her?”

“Of course. I think she’s napping now, but give me a moment.”

Xena stopped halfway through the camp to tie up Argo and take Eve—who was thankfully asleep—from her cradle. She didn’t dare get closer. She didn’t trust her face not to betray her just yet. She tried to remind herself that this child was part Gabrielle, with her optimism and way of talking herself out of trouble and a smile that could light up the world. But she couldn’t forget that she was also half evil incarnate, intended to destroy the world. She would stay over here. But she made sure to stand next to a sturdy table covered in pottery wares where she could set Eve in case she had to rush  forward to rescue Gabrielle.

Melosa returned with a child trailing behind her. She had been barely a month old when they had left her, though she’d already been toddling and looked like a child of over a year. At that rate she ought to have been a woman already, but she didn’t look more than four. She wore loose britches and a leather shirt like any Amazon child, her blond hair was cropped short, and walked with her head held high.

“Hello, Mother.” The girl’s voice was completely uninflected.

“You- you remember me?” Gabrielle’s voice was heartbreakingly full of hope.

“ Of course I do. I remember everything.”

“Would you like to show me the hut you live in, honey?”

“Ok,” she sounded a little bored but Gabrielle, eyes brimming, followed without hesitation.

Xena waited until they had disappeared into the dark to approach Melosa. “Is she really...better?”

“She is better, yes. I have never had to deal with something like this before, but as far as I can tell it’s  permanent . The poor child was born older and then had to deal with all the charms and spells since then. She thinks she has to be mature and adult already.”

“She’s not evil?”

“She is not. She’s odd, certainly, but not cruel. That took a lot of work, I’ll have you know. It took a year of monthly ritual by my shaman before she stopped destroying things in her fits. Soon after she started talking, she would yell some...very interesting curses at us. But she stopped. She  actually stopped talking for a few months, and when she started again she was different. She doesn’t speak like the other children, she prefers to sit with me than play their games, but she has learned some kindnesses. She makes us little gifts and likes to walk in the forest. It’s been a long time since she crushed bugs or bit anyone. I don’t think you have to worry.”

Xena gazed at the hut entrance, which was just far enough away that she couldn’t hear anything happening on the other side of the curtain. “How did you stop her aging?”

“That was mostly charms. She’s worn a rare duck feather around her wrist for most of her life. This situation was less unheard of, if you can believe it. One of my sister’s grandmothers once helped her friend with a child cursed by Hera to grow old in a single decade. It took her half that time to find the right combination of ritual and charm to solve it, but we still have her writings and it took us no time at all. Now, who is this?”

Xena’s voice softened, though her brow stayed creased. “This is Eve,” she shifted slightly so  Melosa could see the child better.

“Does that mean there’s a new someone in your life?” Her voice sounded business-like as always, but her eyes were genuinely curious.

“What? No. Uh, there hasn’t been anyone but Gabrielle in a long time. Eve was a gift, you could say, from someone without much idea of what that means.” She said all this with a loving  half-smile , rocking her daughter.

By the time Gabrielle and Hope returned, a small crowd had gathered to coo over Eve.  Xena was doing her best to accept the compliments and allow the other warriors to gently touch Eve’s hands and head while hiding that her every instinct  screamed she shouldn’t be this surrounded, this cornered against a wall. Which had happened at some point. She might be a mother, and she had already decided to never let this child go, but that didn’t mean she was any less a warrior.

Gabrielle was holding Hope’s hand. Hope didn’t seem bothered by this, but she let her hand hang limply and unconcernedly. She was holding a tiny carved horse in her other hand and apparently talking with more emotion than she’d shown at first.

She stopped right in front of Xena. “Do you still hate me?”

She had never been good with children. This one was odder than any other she’d seen. “I don’t hate you,” she was surprised to find she meant it. “I was worried, once. When you were a baby. But I don’t hate you.”

This was not how to talk to a child. Gabrielle was glaring at her. But Hope nodded sagely and turned around. “Mother, I want to live with you. I want to travel, too.”

“Of course!  Of course you can come with us—" Gabrielle froze at the look on  Xena’s face, her smile becoming a little forced. “One moment, Honey,” She grabbed  Xena’s arm and guided her away into an alley.

“Look,”  Xena had decided to start with a conciliatory approach, “Look. I know you love her, but it’s not just her past. I’m convinced that she is better now, if a little...different. But traveling with a child will change things.”

“And Eve’s not a child?” Gabrielle looked a little angry, but mostly hurt.

“Eve is still a baby. She can’t run away or refuse to hide if we  have to fight. I don’t want her to get hurt. She has a safe, happy life here. You could see her whenever  you like. I would come with you or understand if you wanted to come by yourself.”

“No, Xena. She’s my daughter and I can’t miss any more of her life. I won’t. I know she was...angry at first. But she was never sneaky, and the Amazons say she’s not mean at all. She’s safe. She’s my baby. And she’s coming with me. Even...” for a moment it looked like she might cry or just turn away, “Even if that means I don’t come with you.”

It was barely a hesitation, really.  All of her misgivings about taking a child with them, and about this  child in particular, flashed through her mind. But she would have put up with anything for Gabrielle. She was hardly ready to settle down, but maybe they could find a way for it to work. Or maybe Gabrielle would see this was no life for her daughter and take Hope to Potidaea to be raised with her sister’s children. “ Of course it’s alright. Just so long as you’re sure.”

“Never been this sure of anything,” Gabrielle brushed past her back towards Melosa and Hope.

It was  that that really made it alright. The only other time Gabrielle had emphasized her certainty like that had been the last time  Xena had asked if a life together on the road was really what she wanted. They would make it work.


End file.
